[Review] Soirée Rachmaninoff – a sophisticated evening of music and dance at the Ravenna Festival

A sophisticated and poised evening of music and dance was proposed by Daniele Cipriani Entertainment for the Ravenna Festival 2023, having first been seen a couple of days earlier at the Nervi Festival. Soirée Rachmaninoff celebrated the music of Sergei Rachmaninoff, the Russian composer, pianist and conductor who was born 150 years ago (and died 80 years ago). Mixing music, the spoken word and dance, it was a programme with a delicate touch, even though Rachmaninoff's music in Symphonic Dances – with exhilarating energy from pianists Beatrice Rana e Massimo Spada – was verging on Rite of Spring potency.

After hearing a brief recording of Rachmaninoff himself playing his evergreen hit Prelude in C-sharp minor, the evening gave way to live music from one of the world's most talked about young pianists, Beatrice Rana, the excellent Massimo Spada who joined her on a second piano, and her sister, the gifted cellist Ludovica Rana.

The high quality of the music was matched by two works of a choreographer I have a particular affection for, Uwe Scholz, together with a new creation by Sasha Riva and Simone Repele, dancers and choreographers who work as a team and have a unique choreographic voice, often introducing pathos with inventive, tragi-comic gestures. They are two blooming talents who deserve international recognition.

The first Scholz piece, Sonata, set to the andante from the Cello Sonata, was danced by Rachele Buriassi and Esnel Ramos, showing Scholz's elegant choreography, perfectly aligned with the music yet without ever being predictable. For the second piece, Trio, set to Rachmaninoff's Suite No. 2 for two pianos, they were joined by the Ukrainian dancer Oleksii Potiomkin. Again, Scholz's inventiveness is satisfyingly rich without ever shouting, ‘Hey, look at me!'… it is as though the music and the choreography were conceived together.

So it was certainly a challenge for Sasha Riva and Simone Repele who followed on with their Alla fine del mondo (At the End of the World), the most substantial piece of the evening. It is choreographed to Symphonic Dances – Rachmaninoff's last major work – which comes in at just over half an hour, with ten committed dancers, the use of poetic scenographic elements, and a compelling concept and realisation by Riva and Repele.

It would be so much easier to show a video clip of their choreographic style to explain the magic of their work, but imagine Charlie Chaplin or Buster Keaton, shuffling along, disadvantaged, and melancholic, and then this stylised awkwardness is used to illuminate a delightful discovery, an awakening, or a surprising encounter with reciprocated affection, then that might explain some of the specialness of what Riva and Repele create. Both of them are also dancers and have their own unique vocabulary of steps, and in this piece they were matched by a marvellously pliant and captivating Parvaneh Scharafali. Alla fine del mondo celebrates Rachmaninoff's large hands (the dancers literally appear with large, long-fingered rubber hands yet, cleverly, the effect was not comical), shows the growth and withering of his favourite lilac flowers, but most importantly – with Rana and Spada's often thundering accompaniment – is a captivating piece of theatre.

During the evening, a man dressed in a white suit – Ettore F. Volontieri, former director of the Rachmaninoff Foundation – reads words by Rachmaninoff, taken from his letters and interviews, selected and woven together by Gastón Fournier-Facio in an Italian version by Simonetta Allder. Although Volontieri does not possess an actor's communicative skills he has a flamboyant presence, and what he says is interesting, illuminating Rachmaninoff the man, and not just his music. A man who was born in Staraya Russa in the northwestern part of Russia and died on the other side of the world in Beverly Hills, California. He had a full life, but not a particularly long one, dying a couple of days before his 70^th birthday. This leads us to Rachmaninoff's well-known phrase, and a declared font of inspiration for Riva and Repele: “Music is enough for a lifetime, but a lifetime is not enough for music.”

Gramilano( Editor )

Graham Spicer is a writer, director and photographer in Milan, blogging (under the name ‘Gramilano') about dance, opera, music and photography for people “who are a bit like me and like some of the things I like”. He was a regular columnist for Opera Now magazine and wrote for the BBC until transferring to Italy.

His scribblings have appeared in various publications from Woman's Weekly to Gay Times, and he wrote the ‘Danza in Italia' column for Dancing Times magazine.